Whitman Sisters

Mabel (May) (ca.1880-1942), Essie (1882-1963), Alberta "Bert" (ca. 1887-1963) and Alice (ca. 1900-1969) Whitman, known as the Whitman Sisters were African-American women stars of Black Vaudeville. Despite their forty years of popularity, from the late 1890s to the late 1930s, information about them all but disappeared. They left no film, nor sheet music, and close to no records. They were interviewed in the 1960s by Jean and Marshall Stearns, who included a chapter about the Whitmans in their work Jazz Dance. Their full role was uncovered by the efforts of African American Theater Studies scholar Nadine George-Graves, who analyzed a wealth of local and regional publications.